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FOR THE 



PMOBUCERS OF WEALTH, 



^sa asjc^^aa^ 



THE NATURE OF TRADE, THE CURRENCY, 

THE PROTECTIVE AND INTERNAL IMPROVEMENT SYSTEMS, 



AND INTO THE ORIGIN AND EFFECTS OF 



BANKING AND PAPER MONEY. 



By William H. Hale. 

V, 



7 



NEW YORK. 
PUBLISHED BY GEORGE H. EVANS, 

1833. 







TO THE VENERABLE FRIEND 

OF THE FATHER OF MY COUNTRY, 

LAFAYETTE. 

My Dear Sir, 

In a letter of yours, addressed to an American citizen about leaving 
France to return home, which has just been published in our newspapers, I am 
much pleased to see you express so much confidence that the patriotism and 
good sense of the people of these United States will prevent our bickerings and 
dissensions from terminating fatally to the Union ; a Union looked up to with 
so much anxiety by the people of other nations, as a last hope for the triumph 
of principles of liberty and equity over fraud and despotism ; and which prin- 
ciples, if they cannot maintain their stand here, it is feared will take their leave 
of the world for ever. You will, doubtless, ere this, have perceived something 
in the character and knowledge of the people of this country that has not till 
lately been developed, to strengthen that confidence in their good sense; I mean 
their decision upon the Bank and Debt questions, as expressed by our late 
elections. You will be pleased to perceive that the people are so far advanced 
in the knowledge of the nature of those institutions which raise the few to so 
high and independent a station above their numerous brethren, and oppress the 
millions to the condition of slaves, and which, if continued, will lead us to early 
disunion and monarchy. I hope this exhibition of knowledge and patriotism in 
the people will dispel all fears you may have for the stability of our Union. 

To increase the knowledge of the people on subjects which are of such vital 
importance for them to understand in order to maintain their freedom, is the 
design of this little work. With much diffidence I address these few lines to 
you, knowing you to be a friend of "//ic people" of every country, that, through 
the influence of your name, this knowledge may be spread before a much greater 
number of the people than would be willing to receive it without such influence. 

Please accept this as a testimonial of respect, love, and gratitude, due to you 
not only from myself, but from every true American, for the part you bore in 
obtaining our freedom, and as having been the friend of our country's Father. 

WM. H. HALE. 

Brooklyn, L. I., Dec 2, 1832. 



[Entered, according to Act of Congress, by George H. Evans, in the year 1832, in tho 
Office of the Clerk of the Soutiiren District of New York] 



USEFUL KNOWLEDGE 



PRODUCERS OF WEALTH. 



In looking into matters and things of this world, and 
** settling- the affairs of the nation," there are some that ar- 
rest the attention of every person. Trade is a matter that 
has often attracted my attention, and, I think, now requires 
me to explain, in my own way, its nature and ahuses, the 
conclusions I have come to, and the reasoning which led me 
to these conclusions. 

Trade is the exchanging the produce of labor, or property : 
it is the BARTER of the Westerners, the swap of the Yankees, 
the WRAP of the English, and the cojjimerce of the world. 
Tt is the grand distinctive mark of civilization ; and when 
kept within just bounds, is of very great advantage to a 
people, and next in benefit to being able to produce property 
by labor. 

In this examination it will be necessary, after describing 
the nature of trade and the use of money, to scrutinize pretty 
closely the Banking System ; Usury ; the American System, 
alias Home Protection, alias the Tariff; the Internal Im- 
provement System ; and Legislation as connected with the 
abuses of trade. 

The great advantage of trade to society consists in its 
permitting one individual to produce one kind of article only, 
of use or luxury to the community. Each individual con- 
fining himself to the production of one thing or kind of thing, 
becomes very learned in the nature and constitution, and 
very expert in the production of that thing ; and he is ena- 
bled to introduce all the facilities to that production wiiich it 
is possible to introduce, as they naturally present themselves 
to a mind learned in the subject, and interested in the ac- 
complishment of those facilities. He may exchange a thou- 
sand of the articles so produced for a thousand articles pro- 
duced by other individuals, which he may think he wants : 
so, if he were master of a thousand factories, he could not 



4 

supply himself more easily, or more to his mind, than he 
does by trade, by having those factories the property of so 
many individuals. 

After things are produced, or made into property, then 
comes trade to distribute them to those who want, and who 
will give some other property of equal value for them. So 
each one gets by trade, barter, swap, or commerce, the 
kind of jiroperty he wants, for the property he has produced 
so abundantly, and vvhich he does not want. 

At the first start in the examination of trade, we see the 
vast importance of being possessed of a measure for value. 
In all kinds of j)roporty we have measures for quantity, and 
if we have a corresponding measure for value, it will convey 
to the mind at once the relative value of one measure of 
quantity of one article, compared to any other measure of 
quantity of any other article. 

We find that in very ancient times, money was invented 
for this measure of value ; and, in order to make this 
jneasin-e as little liable to variation as possible, the precious 
metals were taken, because the quantity of it could not be 
increased but in very slow and imperceptible degrees. ]f 
iron had been chosen, it would have defeated the object of 
obtaining a standard measure ; there being so much of it in 
the world, and so easily attainable from the ore by every 
body, that it would have become of little or no value in itself, 
except as a species of property ; and whatever value it should 
retain, would be dependent on the quantity of labor required 
to produce it in any given form or place. Water, we know, 
is of no value ; but let it require labor to produce it in a par- 
ticular place, then it becomes property of the value of the 
labor required for its production. Not so with the precious 
metals ; they have an intrinsic value, owing to their imperish- 
able nature, and peculiar fitness for a variety of useful and 
ornamental things ; they are given out by the earth very 
sparingly, and those persons who collect them get generally 
much worse paid for their labor, than if they were employed 
in some useful production. 

For many ages the quantity of gold and silver in the world 
remained nearly stationary, the wear and loss of the metal 
taking av.'ay as fast as new metal was supplied ; but during 
the last two centuries, since the opening of the Mexican and 
other mines, the quantity has been gradually increasing, and 
consequently it has been decreasing proportionately in value. 

Before the metals of which we make our measure of value 
began to increase, prices of property of all kinds remained 



nearly stationary for centuries. Thus, the value of a sheep 
during those centuries, in England,* was measured by four- 
teen pence ; but as the precious metals began to increase 
during the seventeenth century, tlie measure of value began 
to shrink very gradually, so as to require fifteen, sixteen, and, 
by the middle of the eighteenth century, twenty pence to 
measure the value of a sheej), and every other sjpecies of pro- 
perty in proportion ; that is, the measure had shrunk to two 
thirds of its original dimensions. 

I wish you particularly to bear in mind this natural law of 
property and tnoney, for you will have to apply it occasionally 
in pursuing the subject I am now treating upon. As the 
quantity of any article produced is increased, so is the value 
decreased ; and the tohole quantity produced, uhether little or 
much, is the same in. its aggregate value, provided a larger 
community is not to he supplied out of it. 

In a community of one hundred thousand persons, if there 
be but one thousand ricii enough to supply themselves with a 
particular article, owing to the value of the labor expended 
in its production and distribution, it is evident the cost of la- 
bor must be diminished ninety-nine parts out of a hundred, 
or, in other words, the same labor must be able to produce 
one hundred times the efiect it now does, before the whole 
commnnity can be supplied with that article. The only ad- 
vantage a manufacturer receives for his improvements, is by 
supplying other communities, because he will receive no more 
value for his increased quantity of goods from his own com- 
munity than he did before. 

There is a certain proportion of every man's income to be 
spent for clothing or dress, anollicr for food, and so on. A 
man whose income is 8100 a year, will spend about $16, or 
one sixth, for clothing : a mau of $1,000, will also spend 
about one sixth for the same object and personal ornaments : 
the same with a man of $10,000: but wheie there is one man 
of $10,000, there are a hundred of 81,000, and ten thousand 
of $100 a year ; so if one article of clothing, a coat, for in- 
stance, cost $100, there is but one man out of ten thousand 
one hundred and one who is able to purchase it. Now, if 
improvements in the manufacture of coats can be made, 
which will allow the same labor to produce ten coats, then 
one hundred and one men will liave them, (unless him of the 
$10,000 should find a more expensive article for his dress ;) 

* I shall often have occasion to refer to England, as that is a very old country, 
and we can see and trace the natural workings of things in regular progression 
on the habits of the people for many ages. 



and If the labor be again reduced tenfold, every man in that 
community will have one to his back. You pee the manu- 
facturer would gain nothing here, in his own community; he 
would have his old profit, to be sure, but nothing more. The 
cheapness of his coats would bring other communities to his 
manufactory, and then he would get a new profit to pay for 
his improvements. 

This has actually been tlie case with all our great manu- 
factures ; but more palpably in the cotton and iron manufac- 
tures than any others. And thougli the manufacturers now 
receive a hundred times the aggregate amount for their pro- 
ductions that we may suppose they did when confined to their 
little communities, it is owing to their improved facihties 
having reduced the cost of labor expended in the production 
of each article, and by these moans indefinitely extending the 
limits of their community; and also to contraction in the 
measure of value, of which contraction I shall have more to 
say farther on. 

I hope I have succeeded in clearly explaining the above 
law, as it has always been considered very abstruse, and diffi- 
cult to comprehend. If we succeed in clearing away the 
Btones, the dirt, and the rubbish from this part of the road, 
we shall bo able to drive all the rest of the way ; if not, we 
must lead, and stumble, and sweat, till we are tired of our 
travel, and then give over in disgust, cursing the jockey for 
getting us into such a hobble. Perhaps it woidd be as well 
to examine again closely the part we have just got the lead- 
ers through, and see that all is clear for the carriage, before 
we remount to drive. 

Some people seem to think that, like things of use and 
comfort, our standard measure of value ought to be manu- 
factured and increased as fast as possible ; and, in fact, about 
eighty years ago, or rather longer, the rich and powerful of 
this world, seeking out to themselves new inventions, (as St. 
Paul has it,) began introducing, as a substitute for the pre- 
cious metals, something that coidd be obtained any where, 
and in any quantity. It was paper ! Why look ye so sur- 
prised ? It was nothing but paper, I assure ye. They found 
it was as good, aye, and even i)8tter thasi gold and silver, be- 
cause of the facilities it afibrded them of furnishing themselves 
with money, and because it was so convenient to transport 
from place to place. All that was required to make it so 
very valuable, was merely for a creditable person or corpo- 
ration to write their name upon it. 

What a field then opened upon the people for trade and 



speculation. Every person who had jjropertj then, even him 
of a single sheep, suddenly became rich ; Iiis sheep, that was 
worth but a few pence before, in a little while became worth 
many shillings, and finally became worth pounds. It was 
an invention that made every body worth twenty limes as 
much as they were before. Oh ! what prosperous times it 
made. The invention was called " Banking ;" and any place 
or house from which these papers were issued, was called 
"A Bank." 

There is ono drawback ujion this invention, whicli the 
people have never been able clearly to see. This drawback 
I will explain to them, to open their eyes to some of the op- 
pressions under which they have had to suffer. 

It was discovered by some very wise philanthropists,* that 
a sheep would not support a man twenty times as long as it 
did before : they began thinking and calculating ; the result 
of which was, that a sheep would support a man a certain 
length of time, and no longer, let the jjrice be what it would. 
The conclusion could not be avoided ; the value o^ the sheep 
had not been increased ; it was the money that had shrunk in 
value, by being pi'oduced in such indefinite quantities. TJiey 
very disinterestedly published their discoveries and conclu- 
sions to the people; but. Lord! what could the people do.'' 
being hoodwinked, gulled, and deceived in all manner of 
ways by the money makers, with a pack of retainers and 
speculators at their back, who were interested in making the 
people believe that their money was to the political body, like 
savory meats to the natural body, and not like a cathartic, 
making them void and throw from them that which before 
was their comfort, support, and liappiness. 

This banking invention enables us to borrow more readily, 
and to anticipate a future trade ; but it does not create trade. 
The same trade could be carried on without the banks, but 
it would be less in nominal amount. We cannot suppose a 
case, where, if trade were left to itself, there would not be 
money enough in the country to transfer all the property with, 
which would require to be transferred : its relative measure 
of value will always depend upon the quantity in circulation 
at any one time ; its aggregate value will remain always the 
same, by the natural law which governs in this case. 

Banks draw a revenue out of the labor of the community, 
which ought not to be allowed by our representatives. It is 
allowing private individuals to tax the people for those indi- 

* Thomas Paino, William Cobbett, and others. 



8 

viduals' private benefit ; and it is this, with other monopolies, 
that create so many princely fortunes, and so many, very 
many, poor and paupers anion;:? us. This is more palpable 
in England, and all old countries, than it is with us, because 
the causes have been longer and more uninterruptedly at 
work there, than in our new country ; the effect is, however, 
beginning to show itself, and to be felt very sensibly, here. 

Banks have such facilities for coining paper money, as to 
be able to corrupt almost every body that can be of use to 
them. Hence our very partial legislation in favor of a class, 
and against the people. 

Money, in one respect, is like a foot rule ; it is the mea- 
sure of certain properties of things ; it is meant to measure 
the quantity of labor bestowed on any one thing, or on every 
thing. If we cut the end of our measure ofl", or splice on a 
bit, to make it fit some particular article of property, we act 
unjustly to our neighbor, and defraud him of a part of his 
rightful property, the produce of his labor. In this respect, 
then, we see the absolute necessity of a certain standard of 
measurement which cannot be altered. It is impossible to 
accomplish this so perfectly as we can other measurements ; 
but still, we can approximate very closely to it. It was one 
great maxim of all ancient governments to be very severe 
on any one who should do any thing to alter the value of 
money; and the fifth clause, eighth section, of the first article 
of the Constitution of the United States says, "The Con- 
gress shall have power to coin money, regulate the value 
thereof, and of foreign coin ;" and again, in the first clause 
of the tenth section, it says, " No State shall enter into any 
treaty, alliance, or confederation ; grant letters of marque 
and reprisal; coin money; emit hills of credit; make any 

THING BUT GOLD AND SILVER COIN A TENDER IN PAYMENT 

OF DEBTS; pass any bill of attainder, expost facto law, or 
law impairing the ohligatiou of contracts ; or grant any titles 
of nobility." So, our Constitution intended to protect us 
against the bad eflects of an unstable currency, or elastic 
measure of value, by confining us to the precious metals for 
this measure ; but the itchings of those who are high in 
power, and of those who have influence with them, to have 
the handling and disposal of more money than was possible 
for them to have honestly, has led them tacitly and virtually 
to abrogate those ancient maxims, and these express clauses 
of our Constitution, and to inundate the country with a base 
paper substitute, to get a tax from the people without their 
perceiving it. And this substitute is calculated to take all 



9 

property out of the hands of those who produce it, and give 
it to money makers and speculators, under the specious 
name of trade. 

Banks are mere speculating tilings, created on purpose to 
cheat the producers of wealth out of their labor;* for, as 
money is merely the representative of labor, we see if they 
are allowed to increase the quantity whenever it suits them 
to do so, they will not be long in absorbing the whole wealth, 
or produce of the labor of the people, for their paper money 
and the use of it, which is no representative of labor at all 
in their hands. It takes them some longer, however, to do 
this than a person would be apt to suppose from the fust look 
at it. I have said before that the value would decrease at 
the same rate as the quantity increased : and the money 
makers would find, as they increased their loans or purchases, 
that they would be required to lend more to do the same 
amount of business, or to give more for property of the same 
value as they purchased before. Speculators (or money 
makers, it is all the same thing) buy at the measure of value 
due to the quantity of money previously in circulation ; and 
when they pay, it is done by a new emission, instead of out of 
the old stock, which increases the nominal amount in circula- 
tion, but leaves the aggregate value just where it was ; and, as 
the y^r/ce of all property is, by the uncyring laws of nature, 
established to be a certain proportion of all the money in 
circulation, the next person purchasing would have to give 
more of the money so depreciated for property of the same 
kind and value ; and if he be a producer of property instead 
of a producer of money, he pays out of the old stock of cir- 
culation, and the value of our circulating medium is not al- 
tered by the transaction. If the money makers could buy all 

* Mr. Cobbeltsays: — "When I Jined at Richard Potter's, Tom Potter 
took me aside and asked my opinion relative to a Joint Stock Banking Company, 
at Manchester, which he and others had an intention of setting up. I very frankly 
told him that my opinion was, tiiat no really honest man would have any thing 
to do with such a matter ; that the ' accommodation'' to persons in business, which 
he professed to look upon as its good, was in fact a very great evil ; that it 
supplied the parties with false means of trading, and gave the parties borrowing 
from them the means of plundering them ; that it was a combination of rich men 
to prey upon those distresses which their false issues first served, to create; that, 
in fact, they would lend nothing, and, by the means of pretended loans of money, 
would get men''s goods away at ha!/ price ; that it was a calling at war with every 
principle of molality and religion ; that at best it was usury, and that in fact it 
was usury and robbery combined ; that it must tend to make the rich more rich, 
the poor more poor, and to add to the dangers of the country and the miseries 
of the people; that, in the end, the monstrous system must blow up, and, that 
justice would have taken its departure from the earth, if the parties who had 
grown rich by such villany were not compelled to disgorge." — Reginter^ 22nd 
Septeixiber, 1832. 



10 

the property at once, tlicy would have to pay only the present 
price for it, and the thing would be soon done ; but buying 
at retail, or in small quantities compared with the whole, 
every new purchase would be at an advanced price of what 
they paid before ; and the price being continually advancing, 
would compel them to take more time to accomplish their 
object than if prices remained stationary. 

The aristocracy, or paper money making people, catch at 
every thing they can to make us believe that all they are 
doing is for the benefit of the people ; and they pretend to 
prove their sincerity by a parcel of arguments that appear 
very deep, and in reality are deep, because they are without 
bottom and incomprehensible ; the understanding of the 
people is confounded, and they are unable to gainsay what is 
advanced. The "American System," " Home Protection," 
"Internal Improvement," and such like sentences, tickle 
the people's ears, and fit them to be led about whichever 
way their oppressors are pleased to direct them. 

If we should now return to a metallic currency, it would 
be the best thing for this country that ever happened to it, 
not even excepting the Declaration of Independence ; it 
would leave us really independent ; it would rid us of the 
lazy, vagabond, princely, dead weight paper money makers, 
who are more oppressive, though silently, wherever they 
establish themselves, than any prince or tyrant could possi- 
bly be, and more inimical to the liberties of the people; who 
draw to themselves, in a secret and silent manner, the very 
vitals of the producers of wealth, without their knowing from 
whence comes the oppression, not only in this country, but 
all over the world ; who have reduced the people of the old 
countries to starvation, and are now reducing the American 
people to the same state, by the introduction of " foreign 
capital," as it is called, and by the paper money capital of 
our own country, for which they are drawing interest out of 
the labor of the people equal at least to fifty millions of dol- 
lars annually ; and who have the impudence and assurance 
to tell us that we could not perform any labor advantageously 
without assistance from them and their slave making money. 

It matters not so much what the form of a government is, 
provided that the people take care there shall be no privileges 
and monopolies granted to particular individuals, to the ex- 
clusion of the rest of the community ; and keep their circu- 
lating medium from being tampered with and debased. 
These are the sources of most of the oppression that the 
people suffer under all over the world, at the present time. 



11 

The Americans ouglit particularly to lake care that they be 
really independent, and not be humbug-gcd any longer with 
merely the name, while they are oppressed with so heavy a 
tax for the gralifiiiation of an aristocracy, or unlaboring set 
of drones, who draw all their sweets from the hard wrought 
labor of the people, without giving any equivalent. 

If it were not for paper money, gold and silver would bear 
the same proportionate value to labor in every country. But 
whatever country adopts a paper currency, makes the money 
of less value in proportion to the quantity issued, and gives 
the issuers power at any time to change the value at their 
discretion, by contracting their issues. When they do this, 
hundreds of persons have to tail, (that had^more than double 
the amount of property, as they thought, than what they 
owed,) because tlie money is mostly taken out of circulation, 
which disables them from fulfdling their contracts, by raising 
the value of the money which remains in circulation. The 
property of those persons has to be sold at auction, to those 
who will give most for it ; and as no one has money to spare 
in such cases w ho is in business, for fear of a hke misfortune, 
it makes fine milking for the banks, their owners and parti- 
cular favorites, from that great overgrown cow, the people. 
They keep milking as long as they can get any thing by it ; 
and when they can get no more, they issue, or lend their mo- 
ney again to those who want to borrow ; and in so doing, 
they lower the value of the money in circulation, or in other 
words, they raise the price of the property they have just 
been buying to perhaps more than double what they bought 
it for. This is too profitable a business for them to relinquish 
voluntarily, so they play the game as often as they possibly 
can. 

How long will it be before our honest merchants and 
manufacturers see the way in which they are duped and ruin- 
ed, just when the banks take a notion to want their property ? 
1 wonder if they will ever see that they could carry on as 
extensive a business, (without having recourse to any branch 
of the credit system,) with only the gold and silver that is in 
the country, even supposing there to be not one quarter of 
what there is, and that they would be sure of having no fluc- 
tuation in its value ; that they would be sure of having a 
steady business always, with no brisk and dull times alter- 
nately, but a good steady business for ever ? What hurt 
would it be if we should have to call ten pounds ten shillings, 
or ten shillings sixpence ? I am sure there is uothing in the 
sound of the different words that ought to weigh a straw 



12 

against the advantage?. 'J'o be sure it wotiltl not suit specu- 
lators that expect to make their fortunes by some lucky hit, 
some slight of hand trick ; but it would make fortunes the 
sure reward of industry, honesty, and application. 

What proportionate number of farmers are there in this 
country, who owned farms ten years ago, that own them now? 
Let every countryman look about and count among his neigh- 
bors, particularly those who have been accommodated with 
loans from the banks and speculators. Perhaps you will find 
one in ten that has been accommodated, holding on to his 
farm yet, but certainly not m.ore. With these loans the 
farmers were going to do great things ; going to raise pro- 
duce and live stock for trade and exportation ; and most of 
them did actually improve their farms, build houses, barns, 
fences, and what not, till their mortgages were ripe ; and 
then, " Presto, change, begone ! " as the slight of hand folks 
say ; they found it was the banks' or speculators' property 
they had been so industrious in improving, and that they 
themselves were left destitute by allowing themselves to be 
accommodated. 

The price of labor does not rise as fast as property, by an 
increase of the currency. Mr. Cobbett,* in his discussion 
on the currency with Mr. Attwood, at Birmingham, after 
speaking of the rise in mechanics' wages, as every thing else 
rose by the depreciating effects of a flood of paper money, 
says: — "That repeated experience in all the countries in 
the world comes at the back of reason to convince us that 
the wages of labor never can keep pace, in rising, with the 
rise in the price of commodities; that the rise in the latter 
keeps an exact pace with the depreciation in the value of 
money; but that the rise in the former does not take place 
silently, but becomes a matter of dispute ; that the i)arties 
in this contest are the master and the man ; that the master 
is able to dispense with the man's work for a little while, but 
that the man must eat; that the contest is, therefore, une- 
qual ; that the man is sure to be defeated ; and that thus the 
rise in wages always keeps in arrear of the rise in the price 
of food and of raiment." 

Now this is all true, perfectly true ; but it' does not go to 
the fountain head ; it is but the dependent cause, which in 
this respect is like every thing else, the natural effect of some 
other cause. It is not in the nature of man to be unjust, 
when he can clearly see and understand in what justice con- 

* Cobbett's Weekly Political Resister, 8th September, 1S32. 



13 

sists. In this case the master of course is interested and 
biased in his judgment ; he feels that, altliougii he is receiv- 
ing more for his jnoduce, there is some cause silently at 
work which will not permit him to retain all the advance he 
gets ; and this primitive cause it is that as surely follov.s the 
increase of the currency as its natural and absolutely neces- 
sary effect, as Mr. Cobbett's cause is the effect of this cause, 
or that the sun's rising is one effect of the earth's revolution. 
It is true the masters retain more in their hands than ought 
to satisfy this cause ; but, as they do not know the cause, or 
the extent of the demand it may make upon them, it is na- 
tural for them to make themselves as safe and secure as 
possible from a certain attack, the nature of which to them 
is unknown and incomprehensible. 

All paper money in circulation is drawing an interest, or 
revenue out of the labor of the producers of wealth ; conse- 
quently, if, as is the case in this country, the paper currency 
costs them fifty millions of dollars a year, and, if the cur- 
rency should be increased to double its present quantity, it is 
certain that a hundred millions of dollars would be drawn 
out of the produce of those who do all the labor. It is im- 
possible for it to be otherwise, as there is no property but 
what is the product of labor, and those who do the labor must 
be despoiled of a large part, to enable these swindling private 
money makers to live without labor. This could not be the 
case if tlie money belonged to the people, or the king, (that 
is, hard money.) because wages would always keep an exact 
pace in rising with commodities, by an increase of the cur- 
rency. This interest, with its increase by the increase of 
paper money ; this nightmare upon the labor of the com- 
munity, bears heaviest on those who have the least know- 
ledge on these subjects ; consequently it falls heaviest on the 
fair female portion of our humble countrymen, many, very 
many of whom have been obliged to have recourse to the 
poor house, or to the prostitute shops, to obtain the necessa- 
ries of life ; and (I blush for my countrymen as 1 say it) 
there is more odium attached to their claiming their natural 
right of a support and maintenance from the community than 
attaches to an independent mode of living unexpensive to the 
community, supported by prostitution and crime. 

There is another characteristic feature in the nature of 
banks, which I think should be mentioned here ; and that is, 
banks can never square up, and pay all their debts, without 
being allowed a great deal of time, and there is not one in 
twenty that could do it with that allowance. Whenever 



14 

this work is commenced, perhaps two or three would get along 
pretty smoothly, if allowed plenty of time to exchange their 
property for money, and to get in their debts ; but as the cir- 
culation decreased by their calling in their paper, prices of 
all kinds of property would be reduced in exact proportion to 
the decrease in the circulation, and whatever property the 
banks own, will pay less of their debts as the price falls ; 
and, as the real money has nearly all left the country, tiie far- 
ther the work {)rogressed, the more difficult it would become 
for them to collect their debts, or sell their property. Other 
banks would not dare to issue more paper than common in 
order to keep up prices ; and in fact, they would have to cur- 
tail the business they were in the habit of doing, because, no 
sooner would their paper be lent out, than it would be brought 
back for specie to pay the notes of the banks that are squaring 
up. As there is not a single bank that has specie enough to 
satisfy one quarter of the notes on demand which it has in 
circulation, it woidd be a very ruinous business for them to 
lend on notes which they would not collect in two months, 
when they would be sure of being called on for the payment 
of their own paper almost immediately: it would be lending 
their specie when they want it to pay their ow^n notes with. 

The English government will try to get their paper in full 
circulation again ; and I have no doubt they will succeed, as 
the people do not half understand the subject yet: but when 
the people do understand the subject, they will not be long in 
ridding themselves of this base monopoly, this paper money 
thing, (chartered for the express purpose of allowing a set 
of men to " live upon the interest of what they owe,") and 
all the intrigue and corruption belonging to it. The English 
is the greatest commercial nation in the world; but we bid 
fair, with our national and little banks, to take the palm from 
them ; and then we shall be as they are now, the richest and 
poorest nation on earth. 

It is the boss paper money makers, alias loan mongers, who 
have made all the wars between nations for the last fifty years, 
or more : they lend to either party in order to get a revenue 
out of the labor of the people ; and when they withhold their 
loans from one party, it is because that party has not a suffi- 
cient command over the people to insure the payments of the 
interest, or the other party gives a very great bonus to the 
loan mongers to get them to refuse their loans : so the party 
that can no longer obtain loans, must of necessity make peace 
with the other, on whatever terms they can get: the loan- 
monger has gained his point ; he has brought both parties in 



15 

debt, and those who gain the victory, have the consolation 
of being deepest in for it. The people must pay the interest 
of these debts, created to set them a murdering one another, 
for the sole purpose of fastening that debt upon them ; which 
interest will grind them to the earth, and make them per- 
petual slaves to the aristocracy, or money makers. Mr. 
Barlow, in speaking of modern wars, says, " They are wars 
of agreement rather than of dissensions ; and the conquest is 
taxes, and not territory." 

The people of this country were living very happily and 
very easy without a national debt before the last war. The 
loan mongers of England seeing this, and knowing it to be im- 
possible to keep other nations long in slavery, if one were al- 
lowed to be free, determined to have a war with us, to bring 
us in debt; no matter who we were indebted to, provided 
they got us in debt, and saddled us with heavy taxes to pay 
the interest of it ; they cared as little what we called our 
form of government, whether republic, kingdom, empire, or 
what not, if they could succeed in making us slaves by grind- 
ing us down with taxes. 

All the European governments are under the controul of 
these loan mongers by being in debt; and England had to 
insult our commerce and flag at their bidding, till that coun- 
try obliged us to declare war on them, as they could find no 
reasonable excuse to declare war themselves. Well, they 
succeeded in loading us with a debt, but not so heavy as they 
intended, for they were obliged to make peace in a hurry all 
over Europe, as they found the people were likely to see 
through their game ; and if it came to that, the people would 
kick them and tljeir system too, to their father, the devil. 
They have since succeeded in a peaceable way, in loading us 
with a national bank, and hundreds of smaller banks, uhich 
answer their purpose just as well as a national debt ; but they 
cannot get us to make all the internal improvements they 
want us to, in order to employ bank money to make us pay 
the interest ; but no doubt they will accomplish all that they 
can wish, if we do not put a stop to the establishing of banks 
all over the country. 

The English national debt commenced with their baidcing 
system in 1698; the debt is now four thousand million of dol- 
lars, for which the people are taxed near one hundred and fifty 
million of dollars a year, to pay the interest, exclusive of the 
tax for the interest of paper money in circulation. This, 
nor any large national debt could ever have been contracted 
without a banking system ; and a banking system is almost 



16 

sure to bring a heavy national debt. When a nation gets rid 
of a heavy debt, it is always done by a revolution ; it cannot 
be done in any other way, for the debt is sure to go on in- 
creasing till the people can bear it no longer. 

In all revolutions, the people ought never to take into con- 
sideration, in any manner whatever, the debts of their former 
government ; for they will be sure to remain slaves, and gain 
nothing by their revolution, whenever they pay any respect to 
former debts; the people have never had value received; 
they have been, in all cases, swindled out of their signature. 
It is the weight of taxes, occasioned bytheir debts, that pro- 
duce revolution. If one person holds a note against another, 
and the last denies having had value therefor; if the first 
cannot prove that he gave something of the full value ex- 
pressed in the note, and of as good quality as he had stated 
it to be, he cannot recover, either by law, justice, or equity. 
If the "public creditor" did give full value according to 
his claim, he must look to those he gave it to, for his pay : 
he knew when he lent his money, that the people were a forced 
or deceived security for the re-payment, and that they would 
remain security no longer than till they regained their rights 
and liberties: therefore it is just, fair, and equitable, for the 
people, when they have cleared themselves from that security, 
to let the creditor whistle for his money. 

liook at France ! she has lately had a revolution: the peo- 
ple fought for their liberties, as they thought ; but they were 
mistaken. These "loan rnongering devils" allowed them to 
make what sort of government they i)leased, and the poor 
fools thought they were going to be happy and free ; but no, 
the debt was retained, because it was unjust to break faitii 
with the public creditor : the taxes bore harder on them 
than before, and they find they have gained nothing but in- 
creased taxation and misery, for their glorious revolution. 
Their burdens are now more than human nature can bear, 
and they will soon burst the bonds of their slavery, and, rush- 
ing like the waters of a mighty lake which has broken its 
bonds of constraint, overwhelm all opposition to the course 
of right and justice, with the mass of matter set in motion. 

I was saying awhile back, that the labor of this country is 
taxed fifty million of dollars a year, for the support of the 
banking system, and sitnilar monopolies, of this and other 
countries. I will here give a statement of facts, of tiiis 
country only, collected in 1830, and which facts were pub- 
lished in Williams's New York Annual Register for 1831. 
The capital has been very much increased since that time. 



17 

The banks of the State of New York have*' $27,975,800,'* 

capital: and the insurance of the State, " $15,550,000." 
The whole bank capital in the United States, is "$161,154,- 
535." The whole insurance capital in the United States, 
we will suppose to bear the same relation to the State, that 
the bank capital does, which makes it $89,575,741. I shall 
now double the whole, because banks have the right to is- 
sue double the amount of their capital, and the United States 
Bank has issued to this extent in bank notes and other ob- 
ligations ; and because the people have to pay in insurance, not 
only the profits of the insurers, but also the losses they sus- 
tain. It is the property they insure that pays both profit and 
loss ; consequently the insurance has to be charged with the 
property in exchanging it for other property, which last must 
contain so much moj*e labor as shall balance the insurance. 
These, then, are the dimensionsof tvvoof the machines erected 
in our independent country, for the support, pleasure, and ty- 
ranny of an aristocracy, or unlaboring set of princes; $501,- 
460,552, which, at seven cents a year, for the use of each 
dollar, is a tax on the labor of the people for the benefit of 
those princes, of thirty-jive millions, one hundred and two 
thousand, two hundred and thirty-eight dollars a year. And 
besides this, there is "815,786,644," capital of banks which 
have failed ; together with nobody knows how much coun- 
terfeit money ; and the increase of bank capital since 1830: 
these I think will swell the amount of tax on the people, for 
the use of this demoralizing ciiriency, to ne^v Jiffy millions of 
dollars; a sum, equal to a tax of four dollars on every n)an, 
woman, and child in the country ; and enough to build y?ye such 
canals every year, as the great Erie, or JVestcrn Canal, and 
have three or four millions to spare for incidental exjienses; 
the cost of which canal was " $9,027,456." 

There is no transaction of trade, or any thing connected 
with it, without a consideration for Interest. Let us just 
take a glance at this interest, this formidable antagonist of 
labor. It has been said, that if a penny had been put at in- 
terest at the birth of Jesus Christ, it would at tiiis time have 
amounted to a sum more than enough to purchase all the pro- 
perty in the world. How can this be ? The penny has done 
no work, has produced nothing of use, comfort, or luxury: 
it has been usefuljit is true, in assisting to exchange things 
after they were produced, but that is all : then why should it 
be empowered to draw to itself, in so short a time, all the pro- 
duce of labor of the whole world, from the creation to the 
present time, for this little service ? Surely the powers of 

3 



18 

money are wonderful, and it behoves us to have nothing to do 
with any that has not a real intrinsic value, for the false will 
swallow up the real money, and enslave and starve the peo- 
ple, because they cannot create property enough to satisfy the 
interest of it : so, the more the people encourage the making 
of this false money, the worse they are off. I think the le- 
gislature will have to reduce the rate of interest, when the 
money-makers get all the property into their hands, or the 
money-makers will be subject to great losses, by not being 
able to collect the full and laufnl interest, as the produce of 
all the labor will then not more than half satisfy their de- 
mands, even if they teach the laborer to live without eating 
and other expenses. 

The true value of the use of property, is so much labor as 
shall be equal to the labor bestowed in creating that property, 
to be paid in yearly instalments during the whole time such 
property may last. This is all perfectly fair, because all la- 
bor is performed for some use or convenience, and those who 
use or consume the produce of the labor of other persons, 
should make good what they use or consume, and no more; 
so that those who have performed the labor, may have the 
whole produce of it again, or as much other labor, whenever 
they choose to take it. Those who produce more labor than 
they want to consume themselves, should, if they allow others 
to use it, be enabled to resume it, or so much other labor, at 
their pleasine. AVhat is there in the nature of property, or 
the produce of labor, that should enable it to increase itself.'* 
JNothing, absolutely nothing : it is not like a grain of wheat 
put into the ground that it may produce an hundredfold. It 
cannot grow: it cannot make itself to be anymore property 
than the value of the labor bestowed u|)on it : then why 
should a person be required to give twice or thrice the quan- 
tity of labor in return for its use ^ It is an act of injustice 
to require it, and contrary to the expressed injunctions of 
Jesus Christ. Thus it appears that every man has a just and 
equitable right to the produce of his labor; and that labor 
performed, or property, ought not in justice to be allowed to 
draw any more labor than has been expended on that pro- 
perty : but to allow money, or the representative of property, 
to draw more property to itself, is, leaving the injunctions of 
Jesus Christ against the practice out of the question, unjust 
in the extreme ; for the man who ha* money, has an im- 
perishable demand upon the community for that amount of 
labor, whenever he wants it ; and if he lends his money, it 
receives no manner of injury, for which he should receive 



19 

pay for its use, or which makes it worth a ]e?s amount than 
it was before it was lent. 

For a farther elucidation of the iinjustness and oppression 
of usury, I will refer my readers to the New Testament ; 
and also to Father O'Calagan on Usury ; by which last it ap- 
pears, that usury was not known in Ireland, till within about 
forty years. 

A Tariff is never of any use as a protection, till after the 
ciuTency has been tampered with ; else, why should not one 
town make a tariff against another, and carry the "American 
System" to its full extent? The answer is obvious; the 
currency is of the same relative value in both towns : but if 
the value of the currency could be in any way depreciated in 
one town, so that it Viould take more of their money to pur- 
chase the produce of labor, than it would take of the money 
of the second town, then the first town would h.ave to put 
expenses on the introduction of the produce of labor of the 
second town, equal to the difierence in the value of their cur- 
rency ; or the |jroduce of the second town would be sent to 
the first, and sold for a greater quantity of money than it 
would sell for at home, but less than the same labor could be 
performed for in the first, on account of the lesser value of 
their money: the sales money would be immediately turned 
into gold or silver coin, which is of universal value when left 
alone, and not forced into company with base paper, or other 
substitute for money, for which it has a great aversion; but 
nevertheless, is obliged to conform to the value of the cur- 
rency it is caught in company with : I say, the sales money 
would be taken in gold or silver, and taken back to the se- 
cond town, and resume the value of the currency it finds 
there ; the traders realizing a profit nearly equal to the dif- 
ference in the value of the two currencies. When the gold 
and silver of the first town has run out, their trade is at an em], 
unless they can contrive to produce some sort of thing which 
the other would like to have, but which they cannot produce, 
to exchange for what they do produce; the cheap money will 
not be taken by those who use a more valuable money. 

But after all, what a foolish idea it is to think of protecting 
ourselves from the inundation of foreign produce by making 
ourselves pay a heavy tax to keep them out. Who gets this 
tax from us ? The rich paper money capitalists who own 
the factories, to be sure; not those who have the ability to 
conduct them, or to operate in them. Why not let the Eng- 
lish, French, Dutch, aye, every body, send us whatever they 
have a mind to .'* Surely they will send to us no longer than 



20 

they can get their pay ; and that pay mttsi consist of ike pro- 
due of labor performed in this couniri/ ; for as to purcliasin^^ 
with money, it is all humbug, the thing is impossible ; it 
would be no more than a drop in a bucket. The balance of 
trade to England last year, required $21,880,54] of specie 
to equalize it ; and we had but $23,000,000, in the whole 
United States ; leaving about enough for two weeks trade 
longer. But the specie has not sensibly diminished ; so we 
must have sent tiie produce of labor to some other place to 
get s[)ecie to supply the English drain upon ns ; and that 
other place has to send produce to England, or to some other 
place, and then to England, to get it back again ; for it is the 
nature of trade to equalize itself; and there is no such thing 
as getting the produce of labor, without giving the produce 
of labor for it. Then, why so much noise about protecting 
the industry of the country ? Every thing that is brought to 
us, requires all the industry to pay for it, exerted on some 
other thing, that it uould require to produce the articles 
which we pretend to protect. Suppose the English, French, 
Dutch, or what not, wii! not let us send our produce there, 
without encumbering it with protection duty? It hurts no- 
body but their own people. What do we care? Or what 
ought we to care ? If they send their produce here, they 
must take ours in return, or carry their's home again ; they 
would never get paid for them otherwise; for between places 
that carry on any trade at all, the whole amount of specie in 
circulation, if it could bedrawedout, would go but very little 
way towards paying the amount of such trade, let the place 
be what it may, whether village, city, state, nation, or em- 
pire. 

Trade, if left free, and not tampered with by the legisla- 
ture in trying to protect it, will always regulate itself by 
natural laws, without any inconvenience to the public, and 
very little inconvenience to individuals; whatever is wanted 
will be made or produced by somebody; and if any one pro- 
duce a thing that is not wanted, or that he cannot produce 
with as litle labor as another person, he has no one to blame 
but himself if he lose by it; but if our legislatures encourage 
a person to produce things which he is unable to do as cheap 
as others, they are unjust to their constituents in taxing them 
for the benefit of that person. 

If it is absolutely necessary for us to have a particular 
manufacture among us, let our servants that manage the na- 
tional affairs carry it on, and let the whole country bear the 
expense, till individuals are willing to take to it without pro- 



21 

tection. In the manufacture of powder, cnnnon, guns, and 
the like, it evidently lias been absolutely necessary for us, 
that they be produced in our own country ; and the necessity 
has been felt as strongly, and perhaps more strongly, by those 
who use or consume none of them, as by the consumers. 
Then why tax the consumers exclusively ? They should be 
allowed to procure them as cheap as they can be procured. 

Franklin exemplified the protection system in this way : — 

" Suppose a country, X, with three manufactures, as cloth, 
silk, and iron, supplying three other countries, A, B, C, but 
is desirous of increasing the vent, and raising the price in 
favor of her own clothiers : In order to this, she forbids the 
importation of foreign cloth from A. 

"A, in return, forbids silks from X. 

*' Then the silk workers complain of a decay of trade, 
and then 

" X, to content them, forbids silks from B. 

" B, in return, forbids iron ware from X. 

" Then the iron workers com])1ain of decay, and 

"X forbids the importation of iron from C. 

" C, in return, forbids cloth from X. 

"What is got by all these prohibitions? Answer. All 
four find their common stock of the enjoyments and conve- 
niences of life diminished." 

This protection system has always been a favorite hobby 
with all governments, to tickle and tax the people on. 

No nation, town, or even individual, can carry on a cash 
trade for any great length of time without becoming bank- 
rupt ; they must have the produce of labor to exchange for 
the articles they purchase ; therefore thsy must have labor 
constantly being perforsned, or their income is at an end. It 
is the exchanging the produce of labor that constitutes trade; 
money is merely a machine to facilitate that exchange. 

Ah ! you may tell that to the marines, (says some one,) 
don't 1 know better? Don't Mr. Grind-the-Poor live upon the 
interest of his money ? Was he ever suspected of doing a 
day's work in his hfe, or hiring any one to work for him ? 
Aint he as rich as a Jew now, and aint he getting richer and 
richer every day? No lik«lihood of his becoming bankrupt, I 
guess ; so none of your gammon ; your stuff is ail moonshine, 
to my notion. 

Very well : but where does he get his interest from ? 

Why, he gets some of it from Mr. Vulcan, the iron manu- 
facturer, to whom he was so very kind and obliging as to lend 



22 

the money as a capital to start business with. You see, I 
work there ; so I know something about it. 

Ah ! that was very kind of him ; but where does Mr. Vul- 
can get the money from, to pay this interest to his kind friend 
and benefactor f 

Hey ? [Fery Ihovghiful.'] 

I say, where does P.Ir. Vulcan get the money from to pay 
this interest ? Docs it not come out of either the profits that 
ought to go to pay him for his labor in conducting the busi- 
ness, or out of the wages that ought to go to those who fur- 
nish the bodily labor of his manufactory f It must come from 
one or the oth.er, unless he has a fund laid by on purpose to 
pay this interest with ; and in that case it would soon run out, 
you know. 

Well, now, I never thought of that. And so, as nobody 
can get money without doing something for it, it 's the labor 
in doing that something, that measures the value of the mo- 
ney he receives, aint it ? 

To be sure it is. And now, to take your own case in ano- 
ther matter, Mr. Sledge-hammer: if you had to wait six 
months before you cordd get paid for your labor, could you 
live on the same \i-ages you do now ^ Would not your grocer, 
and butcher, and baker, charge you more for their things, if 
you could not pay for them till six months after getting them ? 

Yes, that 's true ; I shoidd raise my wages if I did not get 
my pay every Saturday night. I know the people I trade 
with would charge more, if I did not pay right down; and 1 
hant got the fiice to beat um down, when I hant got the 
money to pay with : and besides, they would make it up some 
way or other ; they would charge on their books, either a 
higher price than they told me, or they would charge things 
I never had, thinking I should forget all about it before the 
six months were up. And if 1 want any of the things I have 
myself made, I have got to pay a tax on um for the support 
and profit of Mr. Grind-the-Poor before I can have um. I 
see how it is, but I cant see why it should be so. 

You see, Mr. Sledge-hammer, that since the introduction 
of paper, or fictitious money, everybody has become wild to 
get into trade that could by possibility do so, in hopes of get- 
ting a living and a fortune easier than by work ; and this 
vagabond spirit of laziness having brought so many into 
trade who had a little money, or could borrow, that they 
were obliged to sell their goods to persons who did not want 
them, or give up business as traders, this introduced our 
present system of Credit, which is a dependant upon the 



23 

banking system, and was unknown till after the banks bad 
introduced their demoralizing substitute for money. The 
traders understood human nature enough to know that peo- 
ple will often purchase things they do not want, if the time 
of payment be thrown out of sight in the distance, and if 
there be no money visible during the transaction. Your boss 
must follow, in this respect, the customs of trade, like every 
body else ; he must give credit if he be doing a large busi- 
ness ; he must also get credit on the material he works up, 
or on the money he purchases with, and very probably on the 
money he pays his workmen with : so, if he cannot get the 
interest which he pays for his credit out of his customers, he 
must get it out of his workmen ; in either case, if yon pur- 
chase, you pay a part of the tax ; whereas, if the money he 
does business with were his own, the same profit he now gets 
would enable him to carry on business, and he would be satis- 
fied ; and either his workmen, or the consumers of his goods, 
would get what he now pays to support a man in laziness from 
the labor of the community. 

This system of credit 1 should advise you to look over and 
examine closely by yourself, as I have not time now to talk 
with you about it. You will, in your examination, find out 
who is benefited and who injured by it ; you will see whether 
the honest and industrious producer of wealth has to pay a 
tax on all he buys, to pay for all losses the person he buys 
from may sustain by giving credit ; you will see that if your 
merchant lose twenty or thirty per cent, by bad debts, (which 
is a very common amount,) you have to pay twenty or thirty 
cents out of every dollar you spend, to make good this loss, 
and the remaining seventy or eighty cents goes for the cost 
of the goods to the merchant, added to his fair wages for dis- 
tributing them. Your merchant has had a like tax to pay to 
screen the person of whom he bought from the effects of bad 
debts ; and so on through half a dozen hands. So, you will 
very probably see, by the time you get the goods, nearly the 
whole cost of them has gone to support a set of vagabond 
idlers who do not pay for what they buy, or another set who 
])ay from the wealth they have already absorbed through the 
means of interest on their paper stufi', which they call money ; 
and the honest industry of the community has to support 
these two sets of idlers, who are too expensive to be honest, 
without any sort of compensation but insolence and oppres- 
sion. I have no doubt, Mr. Sledge-hammer, that you will 
come to right conclusions if you take up the subject s-vsteraa- 
tically : so I will bid you good by. 



24 

As I was saying before Pflr. Sledge-hammer came along, 
that every nation, village, or individual, that carries on trade 
must have labor constantly being performed, I will now say 
something on that matter. 

Let us look at the trade between New York and Roches- 
ter. The produce of the labor of Rochester is mostly flour, 
a very small proportion of which is required for consumption 
there, and in that ncigliborhood. This flour, after deducting 
for home consumption, we will suppose is carried to IVew 
York. Do those persons who deal in flour, take money for 
it in New York to carry back to Rochester ? Certainly not ; 
the money is spent in tea, cofl\3e, sugar, hardware, and a 
thousand other things that are wanted in Rochester and that 
neighborhood ; and if flour dealers do take money back, it 
must and will work itself into the hands of those who have 
purchased other things in New York, and has to be immedi- 
ately sent there again to pay for those other things. But in 
general, the persons selling in New York, if they did not 
themselves want to purchase, would prefer to be paid at 
home, and save the risk of loss or robbery in the transporta- 
tion ; and they let their flour, or the money they receive for 
it, go to pay for goods purchased by other persons, and these 
other persons pay the amount of their purchase to the flour 
dealers in Rochester. Thus we see, the transaction between 
the places is only an exchange of flour for other property, 
and money is used merely for tlie convenience it afljords in 
distributing the flour or other property in large or small 
quantities, as may be wanted. 

As money is merely a machine to facilitate trade, or the 
exchange of property, we will put it out of sight a minute or 
two, and see how trade will look without it. We can now 
see very plainly that any person, (village or nation,) in order 
to trade, or live, must produce something to trade with, or 
live upon; and that jjcrson will exchange all his production 
but what he wants for his own use, for the production of other 
persons ; so, let him accumulate the productions of other 
persons as much as he can, he gets nothing in fact but what 
he has himself j)roduced ; and he cannot get more of the pro- 
duce of others than what he has produced himself, only on 
credit, with the expectation of his giving an equivalent pro- 
duce in a reasonable length of time. Therefore, if any per- 
son (village, or nation) grows rich, it is owing to the accumu- 
lated surplus of production which he by his industry has pro- 
duced, and not to the quantity of money he collects together, 
as the money merely says, This man has produced so much 



25 

labor over and above what lie wanted for his own use: or, 
This man has jsroduced so much labor for the benefit of the 
community ; witness thislheir acknowledgment, for which he 
is entitled to draw the same amount of labor out of the com- 
munity, whenever he chooses to do so. 

This shows that if any person, or body of persons, is al- 
lowed to make money, or the representative of labor, it is 
defrauding the people out of so much labor, or property, as 
the money so made may represent. 

"Internal Improvements," is one of the pretty and 
captivating phrases which are used to tickle the people into 
slavery. They seem likely to go on here, as they have with 
this and other abuses in England, till the laboring classes are 
left without food more than enough to just sustain life in the 
body; owing, in a great measure, to their being made upon 
credit, the heavy interest of which has to be paid out of the 
labor of those who produce all the property of the communi- 
ty ; they give such a mania and such facilities for trading, and 
such fine excuses for taxing, that there is no produce left at 
home to keep the actual producers from starving : they seem 
to go on as though trade, and a capacity for being taxed, 
were the sole objects and end of our existence. England is 
a fine example of this ; there is no country in the world 
where they have so great facilities for communication from 
place to place, such as roads, canals, railroads, and the like, 
called " internal improvements;" yet there is no country, 
Ireland excepted, where the producers of wealth fare worse. 
The mania for trade there is so great, that the Parliament 
has been obliged to pass laws limiting the quantity of provi- 
sions that the laboring people shall have allowed them, to 
prevent its being carried away and sold : the law, however, 
virtually says, that those who create all the wealth of the 
country, shall have no clothes, no house, no fire, and no com- 
forts whatever, but must work like horses to produce wealth 
for the rich, that the rich may have the produce for the pur- 
poses of trade, to be carried about on the "great national 
improvements ;" and when his day's work is done, he shall 
have a stated quantity of bread to keep him from starving, 
as his services will be wanted next day ; and he is a lucky 
wight who can get the hogs to accommodate him, his wife, 
and children, with lodgings and a little warmth. The scale 
of allowance adopted l3y some of the county magistrates says 
that a man, with his wife, and three children, shall be al- 
lowed eight shillings sterling a week ; that is, when the man 
can get no work to do, for what he earns by work, is deducted 

4 



2G 

from this sum. Eight shiUings sterling a week, is twenty-five 
cents a day, or five cents for each individual, which would 
not furnish enough bread here, where it is much cheaper, to 
satisfy hunger ; and if their wages do not amount to this sum, 
the overseers of the poor must make up the difl'erence. 
There are millions of laborers in England, actually in this 
situation. Before internal improvements were introduced 
upon credit, created by banking systems, in the reign of 
Richard II., men were punished for small crimes by being 
obliged to j^/s;( a fortnight on bread and beer: and in the 
reign of Edward III., there was an act of parliament passed 
to fix the price of meat. "After naming four sorts of meat, 
beef, pork, mutton, and veal, the preamble has these words ; 
'These being the food of the poorest sort!' "* 

Only look at that! Before internal improvements were 
become fashionable by the support of a false currency, the 
people were obliged to stay upon the land, and eat, and drink, 
and wear, all that the land would produce; and when any 
one committed a small crime, were punished, by being made 
to fast on as much bread and beer as they could eat and 
drink. (My God ! What millions of honest, industrious la- 
borers now living, would consider it the greatest blessing that 
could be conferred on them, to be punished in the same way 
for no crime at all.) But, no sooner did the false currency 
come into fashion, than all manner of facilities and con- 
trivances were introduced for taking the produce away from 
the producers, to carry it to market ; that is, to places where 
it could be used for swapping, speculation, and trade, in or- 
der that the lazy and vicious might get a living out of it 
without beinj obliged to labor. 

Governments and Corporations are always ready enough 
to run the people into debt, when any thing is wanted to beau- 
tify the city, or other place ; or when they can wheedle the 
people into a notion to hire money for some other vain and 
flashy project ; or, for gold boxes to give to the devil knows 
who ;f but when called on to make appropriation for things 

* Cobbett's Poor Man's Friend. 

t The unconstitutional and unrepublican ceremony and expense of making 
Mr. Van Buren a citizen of the city of New York, and the heartless debates on 
the situation of the late Alderman Smith's family, will be useful here as evidence 
to prove my assertion true, if any person should be inclined to doubt it; both 
having been before the Common Council within the last two months. 

Mr. Van Buren's case will not need to be explained here, as it has been 
published in most of our newspapers. 

Alderman Smith, during the prevalence of the cholera, was the most active 
man in the community in attending to the sick, and in procuring medical advice 



27 

useful and really necessary for tlic comfort and well being of 
the people, they know not how to take hold of it; it is out 
of the line of business they have devoted their time and at- 
tention in learning: it is something- they are unused to ; and 
they seem determined to remain unlearned as to their duty 
to their masters, the people, as long as the people can be 
made to consider them masters, instead of servants. 

Corporate bodies are generally like spendthrifts ; a spend- 
thrift pays always grudgingly for things necessary to his 
comfort and convenience ; but things of ornament and show 
tickle his vanity, and make him think he appears of im- 
portance in the eyes of others, and for which appearance he 
grudges no price as long as he can command the means for this 
gratification. Borrowing, with corix)rate bodies, is the most 
general way of raising money, because the people never have 
to pay it again, but only have to i)ay the interest of the debt 
for ever. The people do not feel this mode of raising funds 
to make improvements much at first, because the tax to pay 
the interest is but a tenth part of what would be required to 
pay the whole money ; but when the interest of many debts 
has to be d rawed from the people every year, they then feel 
the oppression, when it is too late to be remedied. The money 
makers are contriving and putting into the heads of our ser- 
vants, all sorts of schemes for beautifying and improving, as 
they call it, our public places, that they may look well in the 
eyes of genteel strangers that may visit us; but the real ob- 
ject of the money makers is, that they may lend their paper 
money that costs nothing, and in fact is nothing, and draw 
for the use of it, a revenue out of the labor of the people, 
that they may live without doing any useful thing, or labor, 
themselves ; they give a certain sum down, for another pro- 
portionate sum, to be paid yearly forever out of the taxes 
paid by the people. The reason that we, the people, have 
not been able to see and avoid these abuses is, the ofiices are 
filled with persons who are generally mere tools of the paper 
monied interest ; and when it is perceived that we get a 
glimpse of our true situation, and show a determination to 
take the best road we can out of it, they turn in pretence to 
our side, and with their twattle, blindfold and twistle us about, 

and attendance for tliem. He took the cholera, and died a martyr to his bene- 
volence in the service of the public, leaving his wife and several small children 
destitute of the means of support. The wife became deranged in consequence 
of her accumulated misfortunes ; and the people's ser rants, possessing " a little 
brief authority," had the heartless effrontery to debale at different times on the 
propriety of allowing a small sum a week, to pay her board for a few weeks in 
the Lunatic Asylum. Comment is unnecessary. 



28 

till wo know not which way we face, and then they push us 
along the way they wanted us lo go. without the possibility 
of our knowing but that it is the right way, till we are so 
deep in the mire as to be unable to extricate ourselves. 

The taxes raised directly and indirectly to pay the inter- 
est on paper money, borrowed or used to create internal im- 
provements, would have been enough to have paid for all the 
real improvements, if they had been levied directly on the 
people, instead of raising the interest only for the benefit of 
our paper princes: but as it now is, we have to pay the full 
j5rice of them every ten years, forever ; or, every generation 
has to pay three times for every real or pretended improve- 
ment that ever has been made, till our servants see fit to pay 
off the principal ; which principal they are not able to pay 
in any other way than by borrowing anew, as the interest 
that accumulates on our present debts will require all the taxes 
that can be safely raised to satisfy. But suj)pose our ser- 
vants could go on running us in debt, without the interest 
ever arriving to that point where we should be unable to pay 
it ; where we should become bankrupts, and have to suffer 
ourselves to become slaves to our creditors, and allow them 
to take all the produce of our labor from us, but barely enough 
to sustain life, or fight ourselves clear of them. I say, sup- 
pose we could go on running in debt without its producing 
these results, and suppose the improvements to be real ad- 
vantages to the people, what would be the true amount of 
those advantages ? We get the use of things on credit, 
which we could not get so soon by ten years, if we paid honestly 
for them when obtained : but to secure this amount of ad- 
vantage, we must covenant to pay by yearly instalments the 
full value of said improvements every ten years, for ever. 
The disagreeableness in an honest mind, of using things bor- 
rowed, or on credit, might be considered a great drawback 
on these advantages, but I shall leave it out of the account. 
So ten years is all the advantage we gain by anticipating 
our resources; and the disadvantages, oppression by tax- 
ation and slavery, till relieved by bankruptcy and revolution, 
which is as natural and certain a termination of the exist- 
tence of accumulating debts, as death is to animal existence. 

If the credit of our servants is good enough to borrow fic- 
titious money from those to whom they have given the pri- 
vilege of making it, one would suppose theircredit was good 
enough to make what money they want on their own hook, 
and save the people from a part of their burdens by paying 
no interest ; but no, our servants have made the banks for 



29 

their own use and convenience, and they must borrow mo- 
ney from them for the use of the people, in order to get an 
interest themselves out of the burdens of the people. 

I would not have it understood that I am opposed to inter- 
nal improvements, but merely to the running in debt for 
them. We should make our servants \)ay for these benefits 
as we receive them ; and make them come directly to us, 
the people, for money to pay with. Allow them not to raise 
money by imposts, for that is the mode adopted by all des- 
potic governments ; and is one great means employed to 
create a despotism : no man knows how much he pays in this 
way. 1 pay three dollars and twenty cents on eight pounds 
of tea, and ten dollars and eighty-five cents on three hun- 
dred and sixty-five pounds of coarse sugar, consumed in my 
family of eight persons, in a year; but what I pay on all 
other articles I consume, I cannot tell ; perhaps fifty or sixty 
dollars in all; whereas in a fair direct tax it would be about 
eight dollars, for the support of our national institutions. 
Imposts are the strong hold of corruption. Direct tax would 
be a little more disagreeable at first ; but we should have to 
pay so much, so very much less, as would more than com- 
pensate for the disagreeableness of the thing : our servants 
would not dare to ask for money, except for some specified 
object ; and then we have a check upon them, whether we will 
have the specified object or not. In imposts, we see not that 
we give any thing, and are therefore careless how the money 
is spent ; and our servants, finding no trouble in getting 
money by robbing us without our knowledge, are equally care- 
less how it is spent; and let the amount be never so great, 
they will find a way to spend it, and most likely in a way not 
the most advantageous to the liberties of the people. It does 
not require very deep legislation to spend money when they 
have it, or have credit ; but the reverse, when the money 
must be asked for before it can be spent, and their masters 
do not allow them to obtain credit. Therefore, let us have 
every thing paid for as we go along, and we shall not be 
taxed for interest, to support a set of lazy paper money 
drones. 

I shall have but little to say to, or of. Legislators here, 
as I have been obliged to jostle them pretty often amongst 
other things, in wading through this work. I should recom- 
mend that any member of the legislature, who should pro- 
pose a law, or an amendment to a law, that could by pos- 
sibility be fairly construed to mean more than one thing, 
should have his name attainted, so that he shall not be eli- 



30 

gible to the legislature, as being unfit for the business which 
he sets himself up to do; that is, lawgiver to the people. 

Legislators always have had great itchings to meddle with 
matters out of their jurisdiction. Their duties consist in the 
passing good and wholesome laws, by which justice can be 
administered to the whole peoj)le for whom they legislate; 
by which vice and crime can be rooted out, or restrained and 
punished; and by which habits of virtue and industry will 
be encouraged : but to grant monopolies, favors, and pri- 
vileges to individuals, or to meddle in any way with religion, 
other than to protect every one in the community, in the en- 
joyment of his particular belief, is certainly beyond their de- 
legated and moral jurisdiction, and brings them immediately 
into a maze of bewildered legislation, from which it is almost 
impossible to recover, and infringes upon the natural right 
and independence of the whole people for the benefit of a few. 

To conclude, I would say to the honest laboring class of 
my countrymen, look well after the persons to whom you 
have delegated the power to serve you, for on them hang all 
the oppressions under which you suffer : they like too well 
to listen to the silken voice of your oppressors, and can never 
understand the grufif* voice of the hardy and honest prac- 
ticers of that part of scripture, which says " six days shalt 
thou labor," without their speaking in a manner not to be 
misunderstood. Strive to learn by all means now in your 
power, what is, and what ought to be, that you may know 
what to set your servants a doing ; and also, increase those 
means of instruction by all the means in your power, as you 
value your independence; for independence cannot be long 
maintained by a people ignorant of their rights and duties, 
and of what is necessary for their well being. Make your 
servants stick to the constitution, without stretching it this 
way and that, to fit their own convenience. See that they 
vSpeedily return to the lawful currency of our country. This 
cannot be done without producing great embarrassment to the 
country, but it will not destroy, with the banks, all the pro- 
visions and property ; neither will it prevent the sun from 
shining, or the rain from coming to increase the produce of 
the earth; but it will produce greater embarrassment the 
longer reform is delayed, and occasional embarrassments in 
the intermediate time : it is a thing that must happen in the re- 
gular course of nature, as sure as death. See that your ser- 
vants do not get meddling with trade by pretending to give 
you an advantage over your brother of another nation, but 
in fact, to make you more willing to be swindled out of your 



31 

honest labor by taxes of one kind or another at home. And 
see also, that they do not overstep the bounds of modesty and 
decency, in telUng you what you shall believe, or not believe, 
about "Our Father which art in Heaven." 

These things ought to take deep root in your consideration, 
in order that the smiling face of our country and its insti- 
tutions may not lead you to suppose that trade and s])eculation 
are the only objects and end of our existence ; and that man 
can possess no higher ambition than to see which can be the 
most successful in swindling his neighbor, and collecting to- 
gether large masses of property. 

It now remains for the creators of wealth to say, while they 
have the power, whether this republic shall, by banks, mo- 
nopolies, and irresponsible legislation, become a nation of 
princes and paupers ; or, by taking their proper station in so- 
ciety, swear that the declaration of independence is a truth, 
" that all men are created equal," and show their determi- 
nation to maintain it. In a little while, it will be beyond their 
power to decide this question by any other means than force 
of arms. 

Nov. 25, 1332. 



APPENDIX. 

BROKEN BANKS. 

The following statement will f;ive a summary view of the unjust, 
though perhaps legal speculations made upon the working classes 
of the United States, under the sanction of bank charters, allowing some 
favored companies to issue notes without being responsible for their re- 
demption : 

In Maine there are 7 Broken Banks. 

Massnchusetts, 3 do. 

Rhode Island 5 do. 

Connecticut, 3 do. 

New York 10 do. 

New Jersey 9 do. 

Pennsylvania,... 19! do. 

Delaware, 2 do. 

Maryland, 6 do. 

District of Columbia, 2 do. 

Virginia, 2 do. 

South Carolina, 2 do. 

Georgia, 1 do. 

Ohio, 13 do. 

Kentucky All broken. 

Tennessee, 3 broken Batiks. 

Alabama, 2 do. 

Michigan, 3 do. 

Total, 97 excluding Kentuckv. 

Ninety-seven banks, with an average capital of $500,000 — making a total of forty, 
eight millions five hundred thousand dollars of broken bank notes I and, including 
Kentucky, about Fifty Millions ! ! This immense sum has been lost by the People, 
ruining thousands of Farmers, Mechanics, and Working Men, and, indeed, all classes 
of society. 



32 



EXTRACTS 

FROM A 

SPEECH OP AMOS KENDALL, 

AT A 

CELEBRATION OF THE "CENTRAL HICKORY CLUB," 

AT WASHINGTON, D. C. 



"It is acknowledged by all, that the science of government is in its infancy. 
Like other sciences, it has been consideted too much as a mystery. As in them so in 
this, as soon as this idea of mystery shall be dispelled, it will be found to be a very 
timple thing. It wi^l be found, 'that all just government consists ui protecting rran 
against wrong Jrom hisneighbor. Every step beyond this is an approach to tyranny. 

" In nil civilized as well as barbarous countries, a few rich and intelligent men 
have built up JS'obiliiy Systems ; by which, under some name, and by somo contrivance, 
the few are enabled to live upon the labor of the many. They have been called by 
different names in different countries ; but, until a recent date, may all be classed un- 
der the denomifiation of Kings, Lords, and Priests. Modern times have added another 
class, which we may call Fundholders. In England, they are the creditors of the 
government and the stockholders incorporations. 

" These systems are founded on deception, and maintained by power. The people 
are persuaded to permit their introduction, under the plea of public good and public 
necessity. As soon as they are iirmly established, they turn upon the people, tax and 
control them by the influence of monopolies, the declamation of priestcraft and go- 
vernment craft, and, in the last resort, by military force. 

"The United States have their young JVobility System. Its head is the Bank of 
the United States : its right arm, a protecting Tariff" and Manufacturing Monopo- 
lies ; its left, growing State debts and State incorporations. ***** 

'* The Manufacturing monopolies are, if possible, a greater curse. It is an error 
to say their evils fall exclusively upon the South. They do more injury to the people 
of the States where they are located, than to any others. They cut up the farming 
interests ; they break down the independent mec^nic interest ; they make large 
masses of people the dependants of a few capitalisftk laboring for little else than a 
bare subsistence. Already we have heard of their malejoperatives carted to the polls 
to vote the will of their masters, and of their females subjected to worse than slavish 
labor and most brutal punishment. In fine, they make the people of the North slaves 
to a few capitalists, while the .South and the West escape with being only tributaries. 
If the working men of the country could see how this system operates upon their 
liberty and upon their interest ; if the bills of the storekeepers were made out for so 
much as the price of the article, and so much as the tax— yiwr dollars for a yard of 
broadcloth, and two dollars for tax — seven cents for a pound of sugar, and three cents 
for tax — the whole system would be overturned in a year. It is the deception of 
making the tax appear as part of the price, and thus collecting it from the people 
without their knowing it, or, at least, thinking of it, that sustains this branch of our 
Nobility System. ***** 

" In relation to the left arm of our Nobility System, Stale debts and State incorpo- 
rations, it concentrates less immediate danger to our country, and it will be long 
before it is reached by the hand of reform. The time will come, however, when the 
jpeople will learn that all systems of debt and stocks ate a curse to the country, — littlo 
else than contrivances to make men rich without labor, and not counteibalanced by 
any gcod that can be derived from them. ***** 

"Our illustrious President, in his late Message, has bodied forth the true policy 
which is to save this nation and increase its greatness. Abandon the exercise of 
doubtful powers — keep clcir of corporations — bring down the protecting duties, 
gradually, to an equality with the others — above all, enable every American citizen 
to secure a freehold in the public domain — and our Union is saved, our government 
redeemed, peace restored throughout our borders, and our liberty fixed on a rock." 



George U. Evans, Printer, 1 Molt street. 



POLITICAL PAMPHLETS 

For sale by George H. Evars, No 1 Mott street. New York. 

Six Essays on Educalion. From the New York Daily Senlinel. 6 cents. 

Hard Tinier and a Remedy therefor. 2 cents. 

Rroulton's Report in the New York Legislature pgninst the employment of 

Chaplains. 6 cents. 
A Letter to any Memberof Congress. Hy a Layman. Scents. 
Address of the Working Mea of New York to the Working Men ofUnited 

Sia'es. 6 cents. A 



